


Think of it as personality dialysis; Orochimaru's new groove

by falloutboiruto



Series: You said you'd lend me anything and I think I'll have your company [3]
Category: Boruto: Naruto Next Generations
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Autistic!Mitsuki, Comedy, Crack, Crack Treated Seriously, Developing Friendships, Dysfunctional Family, Gen, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Makeover, Nonbinary!Orochimaru, One Shot, Tragedy/Comedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-19
Updated: 2019-06-19
Packaged: 2020-05-14 20:19:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19280440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/falloutboiruto/pseuds/falloutboiruto
Summary: One fateful yet slightly boring summer break, Cho Cho starts giving out makeovers! Her first and hopefully not last (willing?)subject is Mitsuki's parent, the fearsome villain of Konoha; Orochimaru!





	Think of it as personality dialysis; Orochimaru's new groove

**Author's Note:**

> beta read by: @reaperduckling  
> title from: some wicked(musical) song i think and also slightly inspired by emperor's new groove

Ah, summer vacation. Cho Cho was so sure she’d spend it getting invited to summer parties, going to the beach, splurging on shopping sprees with her best friends… And a few times a week, she did get to do those things! But there was also a lot of time spent binging NinjaFlix while eating chips alone in her bedroom with the AC blasting on high. She liked a makeover show in particular, one where five fabulous men went around in a tiny clown car all over the Land of Fire and made people’s lives better by completely changing their diet, lifestyle, clothing, and haircut. Now _that_ was a future career for Cho Cho if this whole ninja gig didn’t pan out. As she was as imaginative as she was bored, she decided to maybe try dipping her toes into this whole makeover business. Starting: today!

-*-

“Do you guys know of anyone who needs a makeover? Anyone who’s stuck in their old ways, dwelling in a basement maybe in need of some fresh air?” Cho Cho asked her friends, who were gathered at Thunder Burger.

“You? You do watch an awful lot of NinjaFlix,” Inojin teased.

Cho Cho shook her fist that wasn't holding a burger in the air at Inojin, half joking, half deadly offended. She looked around to see if anyone more had something to say, and a few piped up.

“Shino-sensei?” Boruto said quasi-innocently. No, Cho Cho was too freaked out by his insects.

“My Dad?” Sarada suggested.

“Your Dad is perfect the way he is!” Boruto huffed. Cho Cho agreed, Mr. Sasuke really was cool….

“I don’t think forcing a makeover on someone is a good idea,” Shikadai complained like the complainy complainist that he was. Cho Cho decided to completely ignore this baseless negativity.

“You said you wanted someone who dwells in a basement all day,” Mitsuki said. “Maybe my parent could be a good subject for your human experiment-“

“-It’s called a _makeover,_ ” Cho Cho interjected.

“-as my parent lives in a cave and doesn’t see the sun ever. Maybe they would like a change of pace,” Mitsuki said.

“Uh, I don’t know about that,” Sarada said. “Your parent is very… strange.”

“Hm, fair point,” Mitsuki countered. “I prefer to think of it as having made interesting life choices. But it’s not up to you, it’s up to Cho Cho.”

Cho Cho considered her options. Orochimaru was indeed a very, very weird person. She had noticed that when she’d met them. At that time, Orochimaru had just kind of stared at her weirdly (much like Mitsuki was doing now), which had seriously creeped her out. However, who doesn’t like a redemption story? A beast turning into a beauty? Must and crust becoming beautiful fairy dust?

“I’ll do it! We’re going over there today and giving them a makeover!” Cho Cho announced, banging her fist on the table much like a judge’s gavel.

-*-

While showing up unannounced at a supervillain’s (cave) house to give said supervillain a makeover could’ve gone worse, it could’ve gone a lot better, too.

“You want to give me a what?” Orochimaru gawked.

“ _She_ wants to give you a makeover,” Mitsuki explained but only after Cho Cho had already repeated it at least five times. “It could be fun.”

“Really….” Orochimaru said, crossing their arms defensively.

“Yes!” Cho Cho squeaked. "And you’re obviously already so fashionable and stylish, so I was mostly thinking of doing some interior decorating! I mean, just look at your hair! It’s so beautiful!”

Orochimaru gave her an evaluating look.

“If you think that simple and see-through flattery is going to make me oblige, then you are absolutely right.”

Then they just kind of walked away.

“They want you to follow them,” Mitsuki stage whispered in a manner that he probably sincerely meant as helpful.

“Oh.”

-*-

After looking at the interior decorating in the living area of the cave for a bit, Cho Cho noticed a glaring problem.

”Well, erhm. I don’t want to be rude, but you seem to have a lot of _rats_ here, Mr… Mrs…?” Cho Cho said, fumbling with the gendered last syllables of her sentence.

“It’s Mx.” Mx. Orochimaru said. “And what’s wrong with a _little bit_ of a rat infestation? They live here and you don’t, so shut it!”

 Cho Cho wrote down some notes on her phone, but unfortunately, Mitsuki turned out to be standing behind her and reading over her shoulder.

“She just wrote down that you’re ‘kind of like, rude’. Are you?” he promptly informed his parent like a true snitch, complete with no distinguishable self-awareness.

Mx. Orochimaru narrowed their eyes dangerously.

“Maybe…” they said.

 Cho Cho started to sweat nervously. Perhaps it was time to change the subject.

“So, Mx. Orochimaru. What do you do for fun?”

“I like to do outrageously cruel human experi-I mean, I play Snake.”

“Like, on your phone?”

“No, I mean with an actual live snake. Mitsuki, show her.”

 Mitsuki nodded solemnly and pulled out four dead baby mice( _??????????????????_ ) out of his fanny pack(had they just been free-balling it in there? _Gross!)_ and placed them each on different corners of a nearby table. A snake slithered out of his shirt sleeve and onto the center of the table.

“Now we wait and see which pinkie the snake picks,” he said, nodding wisely but with a vacant look in his eyes that to Cho Cho signaled anything but _wise_.

“My money’s on upper left!” Mx. Orochimaru said.

“My left, or your left?” Mitsuki wondered.

“My left, of course!”

 Cho Cho slowly blinked at the snake, which was still just kind of looking around snakily.

“Wouldn’t it just eat all of them?” she asked as her brain exploded into galaxy mode.

“You uncultured _sw_ i-I mean; No, no, no, no no no _no_ ,” Mx. Orochimaru sighed, shaking their head in disappointment. “Snakes the size of that thing don’t eat more than one or _maybe_ two pinkies at a time. How can you not know this?”

“Well, to be fair. Cho Cho’s family jutsu isn’t snake-related at all,” Mitsuki said, coming to her defense. “ _We’re_ the anomaly for having snake powers, not her for lacking them.”

Mx. Orochimaru pretended to not have heard that and continued to stare intensely at the snake on the table. It had now curled up into a coil, fast asleep.

“I guess it’s not hungry,” Mitsuki shrugged.

"Well, you can come to get me when its mind changes. I have work to do,” Mx. Orochimaru said snootily and swished around and left the room.

 “Is this really what you guys do for fun?” Cho Cho asked once she thought that Mitsuki’s parent was out of earshot but still deciding that it was probably best to leave out the ‘that’s depressing’-part that at first had come to mind.

"Yes," Mitsuki said. “Before I moved to Konoha, this was the most fun I ever had. Now that I can 1) hang out with Boruto, 2) stare at Boruto, 3) spend the day with Boruto, 4) hear Boruto laugh, 5) look at Boruto, etc., playing Snake ranks as the 12th greatest thing I know of. My cat Mikazuki, just in general, is sixth on the list, by the way.”

Cho Cho shivered as she physically felt her brain shrivel up into a raisin.

“Aren’t those Boruto things all kind of the same thing though?” she muttered.

“No,” Mitsuki smiled.

Cho Cho decided to drop the subject and instead resume talking about interior decorating, even if it meant bringing up Mx. Orochimaru’s debilitating rat problem again.

 

-*-

“So, to sum up, if you were to put a fake potted plant here it would really liven up the room,” Cho Cho said.

“Why should I? I don’t like plants,” Mx. Orochimaru said.

  _Yeesh._

“But Mx. Orochimaru, it would look nice!” Cho Cho tried to no avail.

“I agree, plants are very nice,” Mitsuki said. “If you go outside, they’re everywhere.”

 Mx. Orochimaru just rolled their eyes up to the ceiling.

 “There’s no point in getting a makeover if you’re not willing to making changes,” Cho Cho said, as nicely as she could in this specific, very frustrating situation.

“Well, you’re the one forcing the makeover on me,” Mx. Orochimaru replied, mocking and infuriatingly fake sugary sweet.

“Well, you agreed to it,” Cho Cho said, feeling as though she was at the end of her rope.

 Mx. Orochimaru just kind of pretended to not hear her, _again._ Which was _it._

 “Has anyone told you that you’re extremely stuck in your ways?” Cho Cho snapped.

“No, never! The people around me are under my control so they never question me, _duh_!” Mx. Orochimaru replied huffily.

“You know, I’m the one who suggested that she’d give you the makeover,” Mitsuki suddenly revealed, making Mx. Orochimaru flinch.

“You _questioned_ something about me? _Very_ interesting _,_ I should write that down in your file,” Mx. Orochimaru said.

But Mitsuki had more to say, apparently.

“Because I wanted to do something _fun_ with you. But you don’t even want to try,” he said.

Cho Cho suddenly felt very, very awkward. She really had no business being here.

 Mx. Orochimaru, who seemed to be totally immune to their son's plea for any sort of famillial emotional honesty, eyed Mitsuki coldly.

“Is that what _normal_ parents do? Have _fun_ with their kids?” they spat out like just speaking the words made chemical burns form on their tongue. “You should go back to Konoha with your little _friend_ right now and don’t come back unless you want to do something actually useful. I'm your parent and that means that you will do as I say, and that’s final.”

Mitsuki instantly turned on his heel and rushed away, and Cho Cho wasn’t about to stand around gawking. She ran after him in the blue-tiled corridors, but when she finally caught up, Mitsuki didn’t even remotely look as upset as she had been imagining. There was a slight pinch to his expression, but that was the only thing that told the story of what had just happened.

“Mitsuki, wait-“

“I should never have brought you here,” Mitsuki said, more to himself than to Cho Cho. “I should’ve known better.”

“Well, you just wanted to have fun! Don’t beat yourself up about it!”

They had reached the exit.

“I should’ve known that my parent and I can never be normal. Sorry, I don’t want to talk about this anymore,” Mitsuki said.

Cho Cho felt really bad. _Really,_ really bad. They walked back to Konoha in silence.

 

-*-

The day after, Cho Cho couldn’t stop thinking about what had happened. She had asked her parents about it, and they had just winced and said that there wasn’t much she could do. Cho Cho did however not like that answer, and got Mitsuki’s address from Sarada and went straight to his apartment building.

She rang the doorbell, and Mitsuki answered the door like nothing had happened the day before.

“What a surprise. I assume you want to see Mikazuki?”

“Yes! I mean, _no,_ ” Cho Cho said. “But I mostly wanted to see if you were O.K after yesterday.”

Mitsuki lifted his eyebrows a smidge in an approximation of a reaction.

“Of course. I’ve already succeeded at mostly repressing the memories and emotions.”

Which was extremely concerning and also just very vague. She asked him to elaborate, but he just showed her in to meet his cat in response. This was  when Cho Cho revealed her nefarious surprise…

“Surprise! I didn’t come over here just to stare at you, I came here to give your cat a makeover!”

Mitsuki just blinked at her a couple of times but then honest-to-god _giggled_ in a manner very unlike him.

“So!” Cho Cho said, pulling a couple of different cat collars out of her bag and showed them to Mitsuki. “What color do you want?”

“Uh. I think yellow? But Mikazuki already has a yellow collar…”

“Well, they can get a flashier one!”

Cho Cho had consulted with Sarada beforehand, and had bought a bedazzled yellow cat collar just like Sarada had instructed her.

“Wow, it’s so impractical and gaudy…” Mitsuki said, eyes shining bright. “I love it.”

Mikazuki ended up immediately scratching the new collar off in displeasure, but as Mitsuki assured Cho Cho: It was the thought that counted.

**Author's Note:**

> please leave me kudos and comments if you like this! :D


End file.
